We support making the environment cleaner, but the reason we are writing is that we are concerned about our electric bills. Many of our members are on tight budgets and the sizes of their monthly utility bills are important expense items. The cost to heat and cool our homes, run hot water and use other appliances is very important to those on a budget.

After news broke of the forgery, Jack Bonner of Bonner & Associates emailed the left-of-center blog TPMmuckraker to say that the fake letters were the work of "a temporary employee," who was immediately fired. Mr. Bonner did not identify this rogue ex-employee.

Apparently, this isn't the first time that Bonner & Associates has engaged in such shenanigans. Think Progress, a blog affiliated with the liberal Center for American Progress Action Fund, gives a history of the firm's "astroturf" – that is, fake grassroots – tactics. In one now-familiar-sounding incident in 1986, the Bonner & Associates was caught attempting to defraud the US government by submitting fake names from telephone books and yearbooks. The firm claimed to have fired the employee responsible. [Editor's note:The original version mischaracterized the relationship between Think Progress and the Center for American Progress.]